By Zephyria Crack!!
Using his God-given dynamic visual acuity, Eui-jae identified the wooden sword’s position and fell into brief contemplation. Should he catch it? No, if he did, it would be over.
Eui-jae wished his brain would work faster and racked his mind. Or should he pretend to be hurt? Yes, that was better! Eui-jae quickly made his decision, tilting his body slightly to clutch his left shoulder. He didn’t forget to let out a soft groan.
“Ugh, ugh, ah.”
“……”
“How can it… hurt… this… much.”
Of course, it wasn’t very effective. Even he thought his voice sounded too normal, and he’d started pretending to be hurt a little too quickly, probably because he was flustered. Eui-jae squeezed his eyes shut. What was with the wooden sword’s durability? A ladle from the Hanover Soup Restaurant would be sturdier!
The wooden sword, flying in a perfect arc, landed with a thud between stacks of boxes.
“……”
“……”
“……”
“It… hurts a lot…”
Eui-jae tried to feign pain with a soulless voice, but he couldn’t stop the container from being filled with a heavy silence.
Choi Seok-yoon stared blankly, alternating between the broken wooden sword, the frozen wooden mannequin, and Eui-jae clutching his shoulder. Choi Seok-yoon was about to say something when, with a thud, the mannequin’s right arm fell limply to the floor.
The heavy silence was now beyond quiet, almost deafening. Eui-jae glanced at the mannequin arm lying on the floor and gritted his teeth.
‘Can’t they check the supplies properly? Those crazy brat civil servants are so useless…’
Eui-jae blamed the Bureau of Rift Management for all the sudden events before snapping back to reality. Now wasn’t the time to blame the old mannequin and the weak wooden sword! He had to fix this hopeless situation quickly. Choi Seok-yoon was slowly regaining his senses.
“Um, Cha… Eui-jae-nim?”
“…Yes.”
“Is that skill you just used really a D-rank?”
A hint of suspicion flickered across Choi Seok-yoon’s face. Eui-jae calmed himself and replied.
“Yes, it’s a D-rank skill.”
“But why did the mannequin and the wooden sword break…”
“I’m not sure about that either…”
He lowered his head. Then, while rubbing the floor with his worn sneakers, he muttered.
“It says my body is enhanced, but I don’t really know what’s been enhanced or how…”
Eui-jae, who had been mumbling vaguely, rubbed the back of his neck and asked glumly.
“Um… sir. Do I have to pay for this mannequin?”
“Huh? Well, first of all…”
“Is it… very expensive?”
[Trait Poker Face (B) is activated.]
Eui-jae rubbed his shoulder where the wooden sword had hit him with a tearful expression, and now Choi Seok-yoon began to panic.
‘Oh no, what am I saying to someone who just had their Awakening!’
There was a joke circulating in the Hunter industry. Awakened who had just gone through Awakening were very, very, extremely sensitive, so they had to be handled with the utmost care, like a bomb!
Of course, that was a fact well known to the staff working at the Awakened Registration Center. It wasn’t entirely untrue. It was what the instructor training new civil servants shouted until his voice cracked.
“Newly Awakened are very sensitive as they adapt to the suddenly changed environment. Small stimuli can develop into big problems, so you need to be very considerate when dealing with them.”
In short, newly Awakened were as sensitive and emotionally volatile as someone who had stayed up for 72 hours straight and could snap at any moment, so it was a recommendation not to provoke them unnecessarily and to soothe them well so they could register.
Fortunately for Eui-jae, Choi Seok-yoon was a rookie. A rookie who emphasized consideration for ordinary people and newly Awakened, and who still had the Awakened Special Act education ingrained in his head!
If he had been a little more observant, he would have noticed that Eui-jae’s eyes looked like he was about to beat someone up, but unfortunately, the education Choi Seok-yoon had received from the Management Bureau, which was close to brainwashing, had put blinders on his eyes. Moreover, Eui-jae’s handsome face, which was partially hidden by the hood, added to his credibility.
‘Well, what would an Awakened who just had their Awakening three days ago know?’
Choi Seok-yoon’s thoughts leaned towards soothing the newly Awakened in front of him before he lost control of his emotions and caused an even bigger accident. Besides, he would be returning to the Management Bureau soon, and he couldn’t afford to cause an accident. Seok-yoon cleared his throat and picked up the broken arm.
“It’s okay. This mannequin is quite old. We were planning to replace it when we moved it to the main building.”
“Oh… is that so?”
“Yes, you don’t have to worry too much. Let’s finish the skill demonstration and then measure your ability, shall we?”
Seok-yoon smiled gently and pointed to the measuring machine. Eui-jae smiled back, but inside he was thinking that what he had been dreading had finally come.
‘Damn it, it’s one mountain after another.’
This damn measurement never ends.
Choi Seok-yoon pointed to the platform.
“If you take off your shoes and step up here, the machine will check the rank and stats registered in the System and display them on the monitor. Eui-jae-nim, you just have to stand there. Easy, right?”
“Yeeees.”
It was too easy, which was the problem. Even if his actual rank dropped by one level, Cha Eui-jae’s current rank was A. That was worlds apart from the D-rank he wanted.
Eui-jae quickly scanned his surroundings. There was only one monitor connected to the machine, placed on the desk. If he didn’t like the results, he could just break it, right?
To do that, he had to divert Choi Seok-yoon’s attention or get him out of the room altogether. Eui-jae stopped taking off his shoes and raised his hand.
“Um, sir.”
“Yes, what’s wrong?”
“My shoulder that got hit earlier hurts a bit… Can I drink an Elixir?”
[Trait Poker Face (B) is activated.]
Eui-jae tried to look as glum as possible. The Elixir given to Awakened who came to register would be a cheap supply, so it wouldn’t be in his personal Inventory, and giving away a personal Elixir would be too expensive… so he would have to go to the warehouse after all.
As he expected, Choi Seok-yoon looked around and scratched the back of his head.
“Ah, the Elixir is in the warehouse right now… Would you mind if I went to get it for a moment?”
“Yes. I’ll just do the measurement in the meantime. You said the machine does it anyway.”
“Is that okay? Then I’ll be right back! Stand with your feet aligned to the footprints. Try not to move around too much. When the machine chimes, you can come down and check the results. I’ll be back soon!”
As soon as Seok-yoon hurried out of the room, Eui-jae quickly took off his shoes and stepped onto the platform. A blue light began to scan his entire body, starting from his feet. After a moment, a chime sounded and a red letter appeared on the monitor.
[User 93, Cha Eui-jae-nim’s rank is A.]
‘I knew it, you crazy brat.’
Eui-jae sighed, thinking of Min-gi Seo, who had shouted, “Fighting!” He wanted to grab him by the collar and shake him, asking if it was really the best thing to do the measurement today, but he couldn’t have imagined that the Elixir he had experimented on his own body wouldn’t work, so he wouldn’t get an answer even if he argued.
Now that things had come to this, he would have to tamper with the computer a little. Eui-jae stepped off the platform to destroy the evidence and was shoving his shoes on when…
Thud!
Suddenly, the world shook violently. After a short interval, the floor and the container began to tremble, and at the same time, a strong wind like a typhoon blew. Even though this was inside a container without windows!
Unable to withstand the strong wind, the hood that Eui-jae had been wearing was yanked off. Eui-jae covered his face with his arm and took a step back to barely maintain his balance.
“Awakened-nim! Are you okay…”
Choi Seok-yoon appeared at the door with a bundle of Elixirs. He must have struggled to get here through the wind as well, as his hair was a mess. As Eui-jae checked his condition, his eyes widened at the sight behind him. A swirling vortex of blue light had appeared behind Choi Seok-yoon.
A Rift!
Eui-jae hurriedly reached out to Choi Seok-yoon and shouted loudly.
“Grab my hand!”
“Huh? Uh, uh? Aaaagh!”
Choi Seok-yoon, who had been looking around in confusion, screamed and was sucked into the Rift. Eui-jae gritted his teeth. An inexplicable cold sweat ran down his temples. His stomach churned. It felt like something was about to surge up his throat.
What would happen if he was sucked into the Rift as well? Eui-jae’s breath began to quicken as the terrible scenes that slowly surfaced and filled his consciousness.
A hand clinging on, begging for help, someone’s corpse trampled by Monsters beyond recognition, bloodstains everywhere, the source unknown.
And left behind in the Rift…
‘Ah, damn it.’
A blue light washed over his head like a wave. Cha Eui-jae squeezed his eyes shut.